In the recent years, people are increasingly receiving information using electronic communication technologies like email, Short Message Service (SMS), Really Simple Syndication (RSS), etc. Various devices, e.g., computers, cellular phones, and other mobile communication devices, can be used to send and receive digital information using these electronic means. The improved affordability and portability of these devices have also contributed to this growing trend. As a result, more information is being shared using these electronic communication technologies than ever before. The information being shared includes digital information such as text messages, audio messages, videos, etc. A person who wishes to use these and other emerging communication technologies needs to possess some amount of technical knowledge about the operation of these technologies. The setup or configuration of the devices that can operate with these technologies can be challenging and assistance from knowledgeable users or system administrators may be needed. For example, a person may need to possess the knowledge about subscribing to and configurating a user account for a particular messaging system.
One example of such a communications technology is email. Emails are increasingly being used to exchange content between users. For example, user A may send an email to user B. The email may include a link to some digital information or content, e.g., a video clip, that user A would like to share with user B. Conventionally, user B would have to retrieve the email message using an email client, e.g., Microsoft® Outlook, open the email message, and physically click on the link to access the digital information associated with the link. As the number of such email messages, and other types of electronic messages, increase, it can get very difficult or time consuming for a recipient of such messages to manage and enjoy the content that is being shared. Moreover, a user may have difficulty in retrieving and organizing all the information being sent to him via these communications technologies and it is likely that the user may be overwhelmed with all the digital information that is sent or referred to him. The need for manual intervention or action in the retrieval of digital information referenced or otherwise mentioned in the electronic messages has limited the growth of information sharing.
The manual retrieval process can be difficult for an average user. For instance, a user may receive an email message on his mobile phone and the message may include a uniform resource locator (URL) for downloading a video file that is 100 MB in size. Considerations such as download speeds and bandwidth costs may deter the user from retrieving the video file using his mobile phone. Further, even after the video file is downloaded, the on-device media player may not be compatible with the video format or type of the downloaded video file. The user would then need to retrieve the message and the corresponding video file at a later time, e.g., when he is home where he has a faster download speed, or may need a device with a compatible media player. In addition, every message that the user receives, which includes one or more external referrals to digital information, would require a certain degree of manual intervention or action on the user's part that is repetitive at best, and may often need substantial time investment on the part of the user. In addition, complications involving conversion from one media type to another or from a streamed media to a stored or downloaded media may deter the user from actually accessing the digital information.